Beer Cocktail Review – Battle of the Grapefruit Radlers

Grapefruit Radler’s – Stiegl vs Tree Brewing: Tree Brewing is 2.5% alcohol, 50/50 mix of beer and grapefruit soda and comes in a 500 mL can. Stiegl is 3.2% alcohol, 40/60 mix of beer and grapefruit soda (beer being 40% of the mix) and comes in a 12 oz bottle.

Aroma and Appearance: Both basically have the same fizzy foam, pale cloudy yellow look to them and grapefruit aroma, the Stiegl has more of the classic grapefruit tang to it and the Tree Brewinghas some grassy malt aroma in there, but very faint.

Flavour: Both have the standard grapefruit and citrus flavour, Stiegl is sweeter and much more pronounced grapefruit whilst the Tree Brewing is rather tame in the sweetness and grapefruit department, yet you can taste the beer a bit more in the Tree Brewing offering.

Overall Impression: For pre-mixed beer cocktails, both of these were decent, refreshing and drinkable and the flavours go nicely together (hence why we love grapefruity IPA’s so much). I like that the Tree Brewing offering is more local, this is a plus for sure. Neither one will get you get you buzzed anytime soon, but I think that’s the point of these. Honestly, these would make nice camping breakfast companions to help nurse the previous night’s efforts.

Rating: I gave Tree a 6/10 and Stiegl a 7/10, rated as beer cocktails, both were tasty and worth trying. If you want to try make your own beer cocktails, here are some other good recipes I found.

Winner: Stiegl, it had a little more flavour in it and just hit the right balance between sweetness and grapefruit bitter whereas the Tree Brewing was slightly subdued there.

Food Pairing: Salty meat actually brings out a bit more flavour in both of them, so go with some salami or some sort of camping breakfast.